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Thos. Martindale 
»905 



Price, Fifty Cents. 






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Wildwood Ways 

And Down-East Wilds 




THOMAS MARTINDALE 






JUL 21 19U5 

COPY B. 




ILLUSTRATED BY 

FRANK H.TAYLOR, 

718 ARCH STREET, PHlLADELPe- 



Some sketches in the collection were originally written fur the 
Philadelphia "Imiuirer" anil the " Wilciwood Sun" fr.nn xihich 
they are reprucUiced l>y their kind perniissiim. 



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pEW regions offer 
more striking con- 
trasts than the sun- 
bathed coast of Southern 
New Jersey and the 
sombre solitudes of the 
Maine wilderness — the 
one populous, gay and 
idyllic; theotherremote, 
solitary and majestic. 

In both I have found 
many and varied 
charmsandlongperiods 
of healthful rest. I make 
no excuse, therefore, 
for weaving them to- 
gether in a garland of 
the cedar and the pine. 



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'The breath of the moist air is light 
Around its unexpanded buds ; 
Like many a voice of one delight 
The winds', the birds', the ocean floods'. 
The city's voice itself is soft like solitude's." 
—Ske//rv. 



WILD FLOWERS IN 
WILDWOOD GROVES 



HA\ IXG met by chance a gentleman with botanizing in- 
stincts who, Hke myself, was wasting time and clams on 
sand crabs while trying to entice the drnm fish to take 
our baited hooks, we mutually agreed that we lacked the patience 
of the late Senator Quay at this sort of fishing and that a search 
for wildflowers might be more sticcessful. Mv accjuaintance was 
a man who wrote figures in the big ledgers of a trust company, 

and whose allotted vacation 
of two weeks was usually 
passed in botanizing — in 
"flowerizing" — let me coin 
a word — in and around 
Wildwood. With baskets 
on our arms, he swiftly led 
the way — I say swiftly, be- 
cause this man believed in 
getting into a "lather of 
sweat" (|uickly — to a ]ilace 
where the road had been 
cut through a sand dune. 
( )n the left hand side there 
was still (|uite an elevation 
of sand, to])ped off with a 
rank vegetation of climbing plants. ])lue])erry and blackberry 
bushes, poison ivy, Virginia creepers, trumpet fiower vines, 
stunted cedars, baby firs, etc. 

( )ur first "find" was a bed of wild cactus; from them my 
guide deftly plucked five yellow blossoms which he impaled upon 
sharp twigs, so that they wotdd show to advantage in a vase 
with other flowers. Descending the other side of the sand dune, 
we found a large patch of daint\- wild-pinks — ])inks b\- name, but 
7 




IN WILDWOOD DEPTHS 



in reality they were not pink, but pure white. Of these we 
gathered quite a launch. Around the Southern crest of the 
"dune" we cut many sprays of the wild coral honeysuckle, the 
loveliest wild thing that can be imagined when it is first seen in 
its home environment; its brilliancy of scarlet, with its delicate, 
yellow petals just peeping out from under a hollybush, or a large 
cluster of the dark, green leaves of the creeping ivy, makes it a 
delight to the eye. 

Next we threaded our way through a perfect maze of under- 
growth, a veritable semi-tropical jungle, with here and there a 
small pond of fresh water, out of which were growing marsh 
mallow plants, cattails, wild rose bushes and wire grass. After 
walking about a half of a mile through this jungle, we came to a 
cluster of wild magnolia trees, on whose tall tops we could see 
an occasional blossom. Some of the trees would l^cnd under 
our united strength, many refused to bend at all; but we suc- 
ceeded in gathering a large cluster of these sweet-smelling buds 
whose fragrance was almost overpowering. 

My friend now piloted the way to a sacred spot to him, 
where the wild trumpet flower plant ran rioting along the sandy 
surface; there were but two flowers in full l)loom, and these we 
plucked, and they added color but not fragrance to our collection. 

We next descended into a swampy labyrinth of wild grape- 
vines and other clinging, creeping plants, in search of the wild, 
white honeysuckle. We found enough clusters of this flower 
to completely fill the little vacant space in our baskets, and, well 
satisfied with our collection, we emerged from the jungle, wet 
through and through with perspiration. Then a walk back home. 
a change of clothing and a glorious ocean bath and the morning's 
delightful experience was over. 

To the casual visitor or the habitual cottager in these parts 
who has never braved the danger of coming in contact with the 
poison ivy in a walk through the yet remaining wild jungles 
between North Wildwood and Anglesea, he cannot have the 
remotest idea of the wanton growth of plant and floral life in 
this small stretch of land. X'o wonder that in \-ears gone by 

8 



this was the sanctuary of the migratory wild duck, the resting 
place of the Canada goose, the solitary woodcock, the white 
egret and the long-legged crane. Even now I have flushed 
woodcock, and English snipe from almost under my feet, and 
many's the "cotton tail" that has gone bounding from his "form" 
at my approach. But alack-a-day, the ruthless axe is even now 
cutting great gashes in the "plebeian underwood," and horses are 
wearily hauling loads of sand to fill up the pools of fresh water, 
so that streets and sewers and sidewalks may be laid, houses 
built and electric light wires rim on poles to furnish power or 
artificial light, and soon — all too soon — the flora and fauna upon 
this bit of nature's paradise will be submerged and wiped out 
from the face of the earth. The grand old trees, the cedars that 
have stood and braved the winter's storms for centuries, the 
oaks, gnarled and weather beaten; the wild cherry trees, the 
magnolias and the hollys, will gladden the eye and afford shelter 
for wild game no longer. With Bryant we may soon sing: 

"Where are the flowers, the fair young flowers, that lately sprang and 
stood 
In brighter and softer airs, a beauteous sisterhood? 
,\las they are all in their graves; the gentle race of flowers 
Are lying in their lowly beds, witli the fair and good of ours. 
The rain is falling where they lie, but the cold November rain 
Calls not from out the gloomy earth the lovely ones again." 

Here, indeed, was a rural, sheltered, imobserved retreat, 
where "nature's rude magnificence" was riotously displayed, here 
the song birds nested and hatched out their young, here the 
muskrat and the rabbit found food and shelter for their various 
wants and appetites, and here the gentle botanist found a rich 
field for observation and study, and likewise for all those who 
love to "go forth under the open sky and list to nature's 
teachings.'' 



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" A wind came up out of the sea 

And said, 'O mists make room for me,' 
It touched the wood-bird's folded wing 
And said, 'O bird, awake and sing.'" 

—Biu7/if. 



PLANTS AND BIRDS OF THE 
TROPICS IN WILDWQOD 

IF SO^IE of the older residents of Five-mile Beach, who nia\- 
he familiar with Shakespeare's immortal play, "The Tempest," 
will brush up their memories, or better still, read the second 
act and note what a marvelously accurate description of Five- 
mile Beach — as it was but a score of years ago — is contained in 
the dialogue of the shipwrecked passengers of the vessel that 
was cast upon "The Enchanted Island," wherein the principal 
and almost entire action of the play is laid, thev will see, with 
me, a startling comparison: 

'Tlioiigh this island seem to be desert, — 

Uninliahitahle and almost inaccessible, 

It nnist needs be of subtle, tender and delicate temperance. 

Tlie air breathes upon us here most sweetly; 

Here is everything advantageous to life; 

How .lush and lusty the grass looks! how green. 
Had I plantation of this Isle, my lord, 

.Ml things in common nature should produce, 
Without sweat or endeavor; treason, felony, 
Sword, pike, gun, or need of any engine. 
Would I not have; but nature should bring forth, 
Of its own kind, all foison, all abundance. 
To feed my innocent people." 

This island must have seemed "uninhabitable and almost inac- 
cessible" to the early inhabitant. A formidable growth of trop- 
ical plant-life, running creepers, armed with jagged teeth, im- 
peded the explorer's exertions to make a pathway for himself, 
without the aid of axe, machete or scythe — in fact, a wayfarer 

13 



who traversed the road which a long time ago was cut with 
nuich labor lengthwise through the. center of the island, and 
attempted to enter the maze of climbing, creeping vegetation on 
either side of it, would have had a sorry time in making any 
headway whatever. 

Did you ever think of it, that here, in the fortieth degree of 
latitude, we have a vegetation akin to that found in the fiftieth 
degree of latitude — or nearlv that of Florida? Here vou find the 




IN WILDWOOD PARK 

gray moss festooning some of the old trees; here vou also find 
an occasional bunch of mistletoe crowning the rugged oaks, with 
cedars, magnolias and all manner of climbing plants — the wild 
grape vine, the wild hop vine, the honeysuckle, the trumpet vine, 
the Virginia creeper and the many forms of ivy, with creepers 
almost too numerous to mention, and all of tropical character — 
without mentioning the flowers, which seem to travel in a floral 
])rocession, lasting through the summer season, some coming, 

14 



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'5 



some going", some blooming, some dying and many of the species 
being also found in the far off southland. 

\\'e cannot but be interested in rioting the large varieties of 
birds that find a sunmier home here, and where many of them 
hatch out their young, and with them retiu'u to the Everglades 
of Florida or the rice fields of Georgia, when the raw winds ol 
October sweep over the land. Other birds which we see are 
but passing visitors, callers on the way north in the spring, and 
resting here in the fall before they attempt the flight across the 
bay. It is said that the solitary and gamey woodcock rests 

himself for a few 
days on the island 
before crossing the 
1 )elaware Bay, and 
likewise the Wilson 
snipe. I have stir- 
red up woodcock in 
a day's march, at 
about Tenth Street, 
sav half a mile from 
Anglesea, in July, 
and the chances are 
that they had hatch- 
A GLi.wpSL OF THE MEADOWS Q^\ q,^|- their vouno" 

there. The beauteous snow white egret I noticed in the early part 
of August, very near the same locality, this bird being a veritable 
tropical resident. The Baltimore oriole and the scarlet tanajer, 
the blue bird, the yellow bird, the yellow-throated woodpecker, 
the king bird, the luunming bird, the robin and the kingfisher, 
seem to build their nests, and make their summer homes here. 
And so does the osprey, the blue heron or crane, the doleful 
bittern, the king rail or marsh hen, while as visitors we have tlie 
yellow-legged snipe, the curlew, the willet. the calico-back, the 
gray snipe, the bull head and all manner of wild ducks, excepting 
the canvas-back' and a few others. 




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17 



The Wild Calf and the Mermaiden— Children of the Isle. 




" Nor heeds the whitening barnacles, 
As crushingly he tramps 
By the sea's edge, along the ledge 
Encrusted with their camps." 

— Troivbride:!'. 



i8 



WHEN WILD CATTLE 
ROAMED IN WILDWOOD 

IN THE early part of January, 1903, my son and I made a 
trip to some copper mines in the mountainous region of 
Arizona. Our route led up the rich valley of the Gila River, 
where the bloodthirsty Apache Indians wander about in lazy 
indolence, a distance of one hundred and twenty-five miles to 
Globe, a small town where travelers take stage to the copper 
mining district, located in and around a range of mountains some 
six thousand feet high. 

Our objective point was a mine near Troy, a hamlet thirty- 
one miles distant. Here we met a drummer for a San Francisco 
house, and the three of us hired a stage to convey us to the 
mine. We started early in the morning because the journey 
was an arduous and tedious one, and, if possible, we hoped to 
complete it before sundown. After a few miles of travel in the 
bottom lands, the road commenced to wind backwards and for- 
wards up the sides of the mountain, and so steep was it that in 
places we had to get out and walk, as the horses couldn't do nuich 
more than pull the empty wagon. 

TRACKS IN THE SNOW 

About noon the snow line was reached, and in the snow we 
saw the tracks of many animals. The driver said that most of 
the tracks were made by coyotes and foxes. There were no 
deer tracks, or tracks of mountain lions. Commenting on this 
scarcity of the sort of game which we had expected to see on 
the trip, our Jehu, who was a typical cowboy, said that before 
long he expected that wc would see the wildest animals of all 
the wild tribes in .A.rizona, in fact, real wild cattle, steers, cows, 
calves and bulls. 

After crossing the sunnnit at 6180 feet elevation, our road 
ran for a distance on the top of a knife-like ridge with a deep 
canon on each side. To our right, on the opposite side of the 
19 



canon was a thick growth of niesquites and chaparral brush with 
many tall cactus bushes, standing out like grim sentinels among 
the scrubby vegetation. 

We were advised to keep a sharp lookout there for wild 
cattle, and sure enough we soon spied a bunch of live feeding 
quietly half way up the side of the mountain. They were prob- 
ably three miles away, and yet even at that distance we could 
see that they had discovered our presence, either by their sense 
of sight or of smell, as we hardly thought they could hear the 
team at the distance between them and ourselves. They ran 




OLD SOUTH JERSEY FARM HOUSE 

here and there in plain view for a short time, and then, as if the 
earth had swallowed them, they disappeared from view. We 
were informed that it was much easier to successfully stalk an 
elk or deer than these wild cattle, which always tried the patience, 
endurance and skill of the luuiter to the utmost. 

WILD CATTLE IN JERSEY 
A score of years ago Five-mile Beach on the New Jersey 
Coast, now divided u]) into the boroughs of Holly Beach and 

20 



Ang"lesea. forming the ends of the island, with the borough of 
W ildwood in the center, was ahnost an impassable jungle. A 
road had been laboriousl)- cut lengthwise through the center 
of the island, by means of which land communication was kept 
up between the two inlets, Hereford Inlet and Two-mile Inlet, 
now Anglesea and Holly Beach. 

Tradition says that the influential family of Cresse and 
others, then prosperous farmers on the mainland, transported 
a herd of cattle over to the island upon flat boats, there to riot 
and fatten upon the rich sustenance which nature had wantonly 
provided for the wants of wild animal life as well as for the 
migratory wild fowl, which found a sanctuary upon the delectable 
stretch of brilliant green. 

In process of time, the cattle became shy and secreted 
themselves from human ken as much as possible; likewise they 
multiplied amazingly, and in but a brief few years they became 
wild — wild as the Arizona wild herds above mentioned. So 
wild and fierce did they become that it was not deemed safe for 
a man to traverse the road through the island unless he were 
armed with a trusty rifle and with plenty of cartridges. 

FEATS OF THE GREAT BLACK BULL 

Among them was a certain lUack Bull, which would have 
been welcomed in Andalusia of Sunny Spain where wild bulls 
from time immemorial have been captured to take part in the 
national pastime of bull fighting. 

It is related that once upon a time a couple of men were 
driving behind a pair of swift horses from Two-mile Inlet to 
Hereford Inlet when they discovered a young calf lying asleep 
among some underbrush. To capture the calf and lift it into 
the carriage was the work of but a minute, but when once in the 
carriage the calf would bawl in spite of all they could do, and its 
bawling speedily brought the mother who started after the now 
rapidly moving vehicle, adding her cries to those of her offspring. 
Her distress and alarm were thus made known to the whole herd, 

21 



which came pkinging and tearing into the roadway from each 
side of the jungle. 

Among them was the renowned Black Bull; he soon forged 
to the front in the mad race, and now if ever man plied the whip 
to a pair of fast horses, these men did. The horses themselves 
were panic stricken and plunged and reared from side to side of 
the road, so that the calf's abductors were fearful that they would 
wreck the carriage, and thus they would be thrown out and in 
turn would be wrecked by the infuriated bull. This danger 
became more and more imminent as the race progressed, the 




A SKETCH Oh THE SALT MEADOVCS 

bull keeping up easily with the frenzied horses without trouble, 
and to save themselves and their team from a fateful end the 
men were ignominously constrained to pick the calf up bodily 
and drop it on the ground from the side of the speeding carriage 
as a peace-offering to the outraged feelings of the furious cattle. 
The herd grew in numbers to such an extent that occasion- 
ally some of its daring members swam or waded the intervening- 
sounds at low water and made havoc on the farms and truck 
gardens of the mainland, demolishing fences, tramping down 
fielfis of growing corn and causing nnich damage among the 

22 




23 



cabbages, peas, beans, beets and turnips, so tbat between the 
terror which the main herd on the island inspired by their fierce- 
ness, and the loss sustained from the incursions of stray mem- 
bers to the mainland, the farmers and fisher-folk all looked upon 
them as dire enemies and rightful prey to anyone who could 
"snipe" them with rifle or gun, and many a one fell a victim to 
the aim of the head of a family who wanted beef for their 
winter's use. 

Then it came about that a certain prominent resident of 
Holly Beach, now indeed, Mayor of that important borough, 
after bargaining with the reputed former owners of the original 
herd or herds of cattle, sent to the city for a prosaic butcher to 
come down with an assistant and bring likewise his tools in trade 
and work-cleavers, knives and saws. Then the aforesaid prom- 
inent resident arming himself with a high-power rifle, stalked 
and killed just as many cattle as the butcher and his assistants 
could dress and prepare in a day. 

The meat was shipped to Philadelphia promptly, where it 
was sold at a goodly price, the hides were cured and salted away, 
and the of¥al turned to merchantable account. 'Jims, day by day, 
the meat dressers working and lodging in a frame shanty, erected 
in the most convenient spot, and the now doughty Mayor, stalk- 
ing behind trees or creeping on hands and knees and ofttimes 
on his stomach through the vmderwood, getting a shot there and 
another here, the wild cattle diminished in numbers with each 
setting sun, until the "last of the Mohicans"' was slain. 

Then quickly came the surveyor, the speculator, the real 
estate man, the builders, the railroad, the trolley, the water- 
works, the graded streets, the sewers, the electric lights, the 
piers, the Casino, the hotels, the bank, the boarding houses, the 
stores, the private cottages, the bath houses, the boardwalks, the 
local newspaper, the Town Council and now behold "the new 
and halcyon seaside resort, Wlldwood." 



24 



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25 




As, with his wings aslant, 

Sails the Kerce cormorant. 
Seeking some rocky haunt. 

With his prey laden. 
So, toward the open main. 

Beating to sea again. 
Through the wild hurricane 

Bore I the maiden." 

— Anon. 



26 



TREASURE TROVE 
FROM PIRATE SHIPS 



WHAT a curious, eventful glamor circles like a halo 
around the story of Wiklwood's early histor}'! From 
the time when Charles II, "The Merry ^Monarch" of 
England, granted on March 12, 1664, the Island to his brother 
James, Duke of York, afterwards King James II, who was 
crowded out of England by his son-in-law, the Prince of Orange, 
to March 30. 1688, when the title was perfected by the native 
chiefs, Hohan-Topatrapanning, Hohan- 
Kepanectamto, Takamony and 
Mothant-Takomis, the 
dians hunted, fished : 
lived on the islan 
and fought interne- 
cine wars with the 
tribes of red men 
who held sway 
among the fertile 
lands and moun- 
tamous regions 01 
what is now known 
as Pennsylvania. We 
may well imagine that 
amidst the dense jun 
and behind the sand 
or in lying concea 
numerous tidal estuaries that radi- 
ated in and out of the sounds, the warriors who waxed fat ui)on 
the rich sustenance they could easily obtain both from the fertile 
island itself and the surrounding sounds, could successfully defy 
their subtlest enemies, for their home — five miles long and, say, 
three-fourths of a mile broad — would be as impregnable to 
27 




assault with bows and arrows, spears and tomahawks as if they 
had been shehered behind the walls of a fortress. 

One hundred and thirty-six years have slipped away since 
the island became the property of fifty-two whalers. Then, 
indeed, the capture and killing of whales was an important item 
of commerce, for our great-great-great-grandmothers needed 
cords upon cords of whalebone for their stays, for their "stom- 
achers" and for their gowns, and the Beau Brummels of that 
day, too. they were fain to use the same light and springy com- 
modity to help them in padding their clothes so that they might 
strut and stalk and pirouette before the fair sex in almost regal 
splendour; and the oil from the whale was likewise of much 
importance. About the period of the Revolutionary War and 
later during that of 1812 this was a center of coastwise ship- 
building. Here coasters were built and fitted out to prey upon 
the commerce of his crazy Majesty George III, and occasionally 
to harry even a man-of-war which, with her deep draught and 
sluggish sailing, would find but little use in chasing the nimble 
coaster, drawing, perhaps, not over five foot of water, that could 
slip in and out of Two-mile Inlet or Hereford Inlet — the bound- 
aries of Five-mile Beach — with impunity. 

After the war of 1812, and when affairs had quieted down, 
many of the sailors and mariners who had taken part in the 
exciting events of the times, became restless, lawless, adventure- 
some, and finally resorted to piracy. To men who had served 
in vessels fitted otit as privateers and which were commissioned 
to prey upon any craft that displayed the British flag, it was but 
a short step from that occupation to that of a pirate, who counted 
the commerce sailing under all flags as his particular portion, 
provided that his vessel could make the capture safely, man the 
prizes and get away from a pursuing force quickly to a place 
where the proceeds of the forays could be concealed until a 
fitting time arrived when the plunder could be turned into "coin 
of the realm." "Five-mile Beach" afforded such a haven of 
security as, perhaps, could be found at no other point north of 
Hatteras. Once inside either inlet, the broad waters of Grassy 

2S 



Sound with its numerous tributary creeks and thoroughfares 
would enable the captain of the pirate ship to "laugh his enemies 
to scorn." The captured cargoes could be easily landed on the 
island, for at one place nearly in its center, a narrow estuary 
running in from the sounds with a fair depth of water, approached 
almost up to the sand dunes themselves, so that the merchandise 
could be secreted in one or more of the big dunes that clustered 
around the island. 

A friend of the writer, himself a lover of the gun and the 
salt marsh, has a fine old ditty which was probably a favorite in 
those rollicking days. 

I'm afloat, I'm afloat, on the fierce rolling tide, 
Where the ocean's my home, and my barque is my bride. 
I heed not the monarch, I fear not the law. 
While I've a compass to steer by; a dagger to draw. 

Quick, quick, turn her sails, let the sheet kiss the wind; 
I'll warrant we'll soon leave the sea gulls behind. 
I ne'er was a coward, nor a slave will I kneel. 
While my guns carry shot, or my belt bears a steel. 

Tradition has it that in the early part of the last century 
the few farmers upon the mainland across the sounds from 
Wildwood one day saw a "low rakish schooner" with a sharp 
bow carrying a large spread of canvas, the deck covered with 
men, coming up Grassy Sound from Hereford Inlet. She was 
closely followed by a small l)rig whose sails had evidently been 
punctured with cannon balls fired at close quarters, as the holes 
showed powder marks around the edges, and besides these tell- 
tale marks, her spars were splintered, her foremast being broken 
off short, her rigging badly out of gear, the ropes- showing rough 
splices here and there, while she had an ugly looking hole near 
her bow close to the water-line, into and out of which the water 
surged with every heave of the craft. The farmers rightlv con- 
jectured that the first vessel was a pirate and the second a prize 
which the pirate had captured and manned with a crew. The 
pirates ca.st anchor near the mouth of the little estuary or bay 
29 



described above and lay there during the balance of the day. The 
pirates were soon at work washing their clothing and hanging it 
on the rigging to dry, while a boat's crew put ofif into the sounds 
at near low water and soon returned with a deck load of large, 
succulent oysters which the men had gathered from the flats 
after the tide had run out. When the shades of night had fallen, 
and while the observers could not differentiate objects in the 
darkness, they noticed lanterns waving here and there, which 
were evidently being used to guide small boats from the vessels 




WHERE THE PIRATES LANDED 

up the narrow estuary where they were unloaded, near the woods, 
and it was rightly conjectured that the contents were spoils 
of plundered vessels for which the crews were finding hiding 
places in the interior of the island, so it came to pass that night 
after night and day by day for some ten days the same pro- 
grannne was carried out. Human nature being alike from one 
century to another, we need not wonder that these weird pro- 
ceedings set the farmers all agog, and it wasn't long until the 
news spread to the settlement at Rio (irande, to Cold Spring, to 



Cape May Court House and to Cape May itself, only eight miles 
away, and the residents of these places hurried to the nearest 
point of observation, where they held excited and whispered 
conversations. Finally one day the two vessels sailed away 
with the ebb tide. The vessels were obliged necessarily to 
approach the mainland in keeping to the center of the channel; 
it was then seen that the captured brig had been patched up 
during her stay; the hole in her bow was closed, the sails were 
repaired and the cordage mended and readjusted, the broken 
foremast had been deftly spliced or mortised so that it looked as 
good as new, and the brig w^ore a jaunty, defiant air and seemed 
to carry a large crew of men who were in no wise afraid of being 
seen. The farmers, however, kept themselves discreetly ob- 
scured in the undergrowth which surrounded their farms for fear 
the pirates might fire a shot or two from their eight-pounder 
guns. That self-same day, however, the boldest spirits among 
them decided that having carefully noted the direction the lighted 
lanterns took every night, and surmising that they would have 
no trouble in locating the spot where the supposed spoils were 
secreted, agreed among themselves that the next morning at 
break of day they would invade the island and raid the cache 
when found. 

Some nineteen men gathered together at the appointed 
time; prominent among them were four }Oung farmers from 
Cape May; these four men, who were said to be the leaders of 
the party, were stout-hearted, honest sons of toil, who feared 
neither man nor beast. The day was not propitious, a northeast 
wind had set in which backed u]) the ebbing tide and made the 
trip across the sound rcMigh and Ijoisterous, but they landed 
safely near the spot where they were sure they would find the 
path over which the pirates had traveled. Indeed, it was easily 
found, for it was deeply furrowed with the marks of heavy 
weights which had been carried o\er it. It led to the interior 
of the island through a matted growth of wild creeping and 
hanging vines. The men ]nirsued their way cautiously, stepping 
lightly and peering out in all directions as they advanced. They 

31 



reached a place where the vegetation was so thick as to ahriost 
exckide the Hght and standing there, not knowing whether to 
go further or not, they were startled beyond measure by the 
report of four shotguns from out of the dusky recesses, accom- 
panied by a hail of small shot which stung most of them on 
the face and neck. Having no firearms with them, they incon- 
tinently fled to their boats and made a rapid retreat to the main- 
land, where they helped each other in picking out the pellets of 
lead that had struck them. The next day, armed with rifles and 
accompanied by a motley pack of dogs — hounds, bull-dogs, 
shepherd dogs and terriers — they craftily approached the scene 
of the shooting. Believing that they were being watched by some 
of the pirates who had been left behind, they sent the dogs in 
ahead and soon they heard shots and the cries of wounded dogs. 
The farmers now charged in the direction from which the sounds 
came and, while by reason of the dense underbrush their progress 
w-as slow, yet they finally were gratified to hear from the barking 
of the dogs that the men were on the run. The pirates kept 
repeatedly turning on the dogs and shooting at them, but evi- 
dently feared to fire on the farmers, and so the chase continued 
to the southern end of the island, where upon emerging on the 
meadows among the holl}' trees (which gave to Holly Beach its 
name) the farmers discovered four men already in a rowboat 
and rapidly making their way across the inlet to Two-mile Beach ; 
as soon as they could draw a bead upon the fleeing men, they 
fired and kept firing at them. One man was seen to fall forward 
and another to drop his oar, but with great effort they reached 
the opposite shore in a disordered condition and at once made 
their way into the brush, the soimd men dragging the wounded 
men along with them. As they were never seen again, it was 
supposed that they eventually worked their way into the Dela- 
ware River, and l)y rowing with the flood-tides, reached New 
Castle, Del., wliere the wounded men would find medical treat- 
ment and, perhaps, recover. 

The victors now retraced their way to the dunes, and with 
little dif¥icultv found the "treasure trove'' buried in the side of 



one of the big sand hills. Here were rich silks carefuly sewed 
up in oil silk, satins and velvets, gruns. boxes of indigo, boxes of 
fine teas, rare spices, a few bags of Spanish golden doubloons 
and English silver half-crowns, but not as many by any means 
as the men had expected to find, although several boatloads of 
plunder were unearthed in all. The spoils were quickly boated 
over to the mainland, where a fair division was made of the booty, 
and for half a century after that, relics of the foray might occa- 
sionally be found in the houses along and around the cape. It 
was supposed that the four men w^ere left as a guard over the 
treasures until the return of the pirate schooner, but whether the 
watchers were able to acquaint their chief with their direful news 
and thus prevent his returning to the island or not was never 
known, as the pirates' vessel was seen no more in that vicinity. 
Some years afterwards, a girl who went b\' the name of 
Peterson and another called Anita Erickson, came each into 
possession of a scarlet silk shawl that had been a portion of 
the pirate's spoils. With these on their shoulders they were 
sauntering idly through the woods and following the road that 
was cut lengthwise of the island. The day was fine, and the girls 
were laughing and talking about their l)eaux, when they looked 
tip and found confronting them a herd of wild cattle. A fierce 
bull, seeing the red shawls, at once charged the defenceless girls, 
and with loud, resounding screams they at once started to run. 
On one side of them was an impenetrable mass of vegetation, 
on the other a small fresh water pond. Growing out of the pond 
was a few w ild magnolia trees, and two of these trees were grow- 
ing at such an angle as to enable the girls to climb up to a posi- 
tion of safety. liut the cattle kept surging around the base of 
the trees, pawing up the mud and throwing it over iheir backs, 
and seemed in no haste to leave, so the girls, in order to a])pease 
their wrath, were constrained to throw down the offending shawls 
as a peace offering to the outraged feelings of the infuriated 
cattle. They soon tram])ed the flaring shawls out of sight in the 
mud and then apparently satisfied they sullenly moved away, and 
shortly before nightfall the imprisoned girls were found by a 

33 



party of their relatives who had started out in search of them. 
It was a happy deliverance for the girls, as they did not dare to 
descend the trees for fear the cattle would meet them again; but 
all's well that ends well; once in their homes in Holly Beach they 
soon forgot their terror, but of red silk shawls they never wanted 
to see another. 




W 



34 



11 




35 




' The windows rattling in tlieir frames, 
The ocean roaring on the beach, 
The gusty blast, the bickering flames. 
All mingled vaguely in our speech." 

— Longfello'W. 



36 



OLD TALES RETOLD 



I 



N DAYS PRLMEX'AL. long before the advent of the white 
man, theeopper-colored savage lived, fonght and died on 
Five-mile Beach within sound of the restless ocean on one 
side and the soughing trees on the other. The story of his life 
is silently told when the spade brings to light the proofs that 
the bow and s])ear were his weapons of the chase as well as of 
combat, that a trinmied flake of flint or "a splinter of argillite'' 

was a knife (and many are the 
sizes of such knives that have 
been thus turned up, broken 
pottery, bowls and shallow 
dishes are nuUe witnesses 
that the mysterious natives 
often had times of feasting 
when the meals were served 
in earthen dishes. The spade 
has likewise resurrected the 
bones of elk. deer, bear, 
beaver, fox, raccoon, nmskrat, 
gray squirrel and the cotton- 
tail rabbit, besides those of 
the wild turkey and iish of 
man\ kinds, so that with the 
above and the fat and luscious 
oysters and succulent clams that thrived in every sound, the 
red man veritably lived on the fat of the land. P)Ut how the 
ground in .South jersev has raised sinee those halcyon davs! 
In sinking artesian wells in Wildwood, tlu drill has gone through 
a solid log at a depth of over three hmidred feet. Think of 
It. those of you who delight in the marvelous! I low many, 
manv hundreds of graves of the great original dwellers nia\' lie 




37 



under our very feet, "For all that tread the globe are but a hand- 
ful to the tribes that slumber in its bosom." Take the wings 

Of morning, pierce the Barcan Wilderness, 
Or lose thyself in continuous woods 
Where rolls the Oregon and hears no sound 
Save his own dashings — yet the dead are there! 
And millions in those solitudes, since first 
The flight of years began, have laid them down 
fn their last sleep — the dead reign there alone!" 

It is asserted that the Indians — our Indians — were derived 
from the great Algonquin tribe, locally called the Lenni-Lenapes 
or Delawares, and their last king, Nunnny, was buried on the 
land now known as Nummy's Island on the north side of Grassy 
Sound and at present crossed by the wires and poles of the life- 
saver's telegraph line. What a burial place for a king, with the 
waves singing a daily requiem over his remains and the mystic 
electric current flashing messages of grave import over them 
for the safety of the mariners who sail their craft within seeing 
distance of his now leveled mound! History tells us that no 
part of New Jersey was taken from the Indians by force; the 
iridescent string of beads, the loads of wampum, the seductive 
fire-water, powder, shot and ball-muskets and the old arquebuss 
no doubt were of sufficier.t attracti(Mi to make the guileless 
natives part with their rich lands and happy hunting grotmds. 
and when these were bartered away, then followed their long 
migration to Indiana. It's but a sad, sad tale at the best, this 
passing of the red man to make room for the Anglo-Saxon white 
man. 

The old chronicler De Vries in 1633 records that during his 
time whale fishing was carried on with success along this portion 
of the Jersey coast by whalers from Xew Haven, Connecticut, 
and that a ]:)arty struck a school of whales, capturing seven out 
of the bunch. In 1718 six whales were taken, and in 1752 a like 
number. \u 1634 Lieutenant Robert Evelyn saw great numbers 
of wild swans and wild geese, and all manner of ducks in almost 
incredibly large flocks; wild ])igeons and wild turkeys; also — 

3« 



and mark \ou this — bison, l)lack-l)ear, panthers, wolves, foxes, 
otters, deer and beavers. Jacol) Spicer, John Townsend and 
the Hands, Stites. Crawfords, Ludlanis, Hewitts, Hohnes, Cor- 
sons. Learnings, Shellinks, Whilldens, Willets, Cresses, Goffs. 
Youngs. Eldredges, Godfreys, Mathews — all of them settlers in 
and about here from 1685 to 1691 — must have lived like "barons 
of old" on roast wild fowl, venison, wild turkey, roasted wild 
pigeons, oysters on the half shell and clam chowders. Where else 
in all the world at that time or since could such a paradise of 
wild game and dainty sea food be found. To the man with any 
hunting instincts in his blood, such a recital as the above makes 
him look back over the two centuries and more since then with 
fond reflections, and he is apt to regret that he was l)orn in the 
double breech-loading shot-gun and multiplying-fishing-rod-reel 
age and not in the days we are now writing about. Indeed, it is 
enough to make our great hunting ancestor Ximrocl, turn over 
in his grave with envy. 

A few years since a copy of an old pamphlet was found, 
printed in London in 1681, by agents interested in the coloniza- 
tion of West Jersey. It sets forth the advantages of this new- 
country and so well describes the system of ])roprietorv tracts 
from which all present titles descend that it is worth ([noting in 
part : 

"The -Method laid down for .Sale and Division of the Country 
of West-Jersey, is by Proprieties, (that is to say) One Propriety 
contains the Hundredth Part of the Whole Country: Of which 
Proprieties, many are already .Sold, and dis])osed of to Pur- 
chasers; & Several of the same remains yet to be Sold. In each 
of these Hundred Parts c^r Proprieties, the Quantity of Acres, 
camiot be absolutely Ascertained; but its generally judged to be 
Twenty Thousand Acres, and u])wards; but some have accounted 
each Propriety to contain nuich more. And if any Person be not 
minded to deal for a Whole Propriety; Two, b\)ur, Si.x, lught. 
or more, may jo\n in the purchase thereof; There being Land 
enough in one of these Proprieties for manv I'amilics. 

"The I)i\'iding, and Laying out the Land is done by Com- 

39 



niissioners appointed upon the Place. And there is a large Tract 
of Land containing above Sixty English Miles, lying along the 
River of Delaware, taken up, and Bought of the Natives: The 
Commissioners lay out (at present) about Five or Six Thousand 
Acres of Land for a Propriety out of this Tract, as People come 
over that have bought: By which ]\Ieans, the People settle near 
together, for their Conveniency of Trade and Conmierce. And 
when this Tract of Land is all Settled, then it's intended to take 
up another Tract of Land, and proceed in the saine Method; 
and so in like manner to continue, until the Whole Country is 
Divided. And the said Commissioners, for dividing the same, 
are to be Chosen by the General-Assemblv of the Colony, with 
Approbation of the Governor, or His Deputy, upon the Place. 

"As for the Deeds or Conveyances, signed, or to be signed 
by Edw^ard [Billinge] and His Trustees, they were at first drawn 
up by able Counsellors at Law, and are [all| after one manner: 
So that, every Purchaser hath alike Priviledge. 

"For Transportation of Passengers to West-[ersev, Ships 
set Sail from London generally Once in Three Months, some- 
times in Two Months: The Master gives Notice Six Weeks (or 
more) of his Going before-hand. 

"The Price for every Passenger, (that is to say) for Men 
and Women, Meat, Drink, and Passage, with a Chest, is Five 
Pounds sterling per Head: For Children o{ Twelve Years of 
Age, and under. Fifty Shillings ]:>er Head; Sucking Children, 
Nothing: For Goods, Forty Shillings a Tun Freight, to be 
Landed at Burlington, or elsewhere upon Delaware-River. 

"Sometimes, ships go from Dublin, sometimes from Hull: 
But if any Persons, to the Number of Thirty, or more, in Scot- 
land or Ireland, desiring to be taken in There, the Ship-Master 
will take them in at Leith, Dundee, or Aberdeen on the East, and 
at Aire on the West of Scotland, and at Dublin or Waterford in 
Ireland; so as they order some Person in London, to agree, and 
give Security for so many l^assengers to be ready at the Tinie 
and Place agreed upon, to be taken aboard, with Account how 
many Tmi of Goods they intend to Ship. And the conunodities 

40 



fit to be carryed to Xew Jersey, are such as are usually carryed 
to A'irginia, New-York, or ^lary-Land." 

Real estate deals iu those days were very a])t to be g"igaiilic 
ones, such as Wni. Penn's g"rant covering a large portion of 
Pennsylvania and others of lesser magnitude. In 1688 Dr. 
Daniel Coxe. of London, who was physician to Charles II, pur- 
chased outright 95,000 acres of land and later, l)ought all of the 
Indians' titles throug-h his agent, Alfred Bonde, from the mouth 
of Egg Harbor to Cape May and extending northwesterly to 
the Cohansey River. By some freak of fortune or of royal favor, 
l^r. Coxe likewise held title from the Atlantic to the Pacific 
l^etween the thirtv-first and thirty-sixth degrees of latitude. 
\\ hat think you of that for a real estate transaction? Coxe 
Hall, two stories high, with observatory and large apartments 
at Town Bank, a few miles from I'^ive-mile B.each, was for many, 
many years a princely mansion among the ]:)ines and cedars, and 
the wonder of those days. 

In certain proceedings before the Lords of Trade in London 
in 1699, it was reported that pirates had been burying plunder 
on Five-mile Beach and vicinitv from captiu'ed vessels that sailed 
up and down the Spanish main, and L"a])tain Kidd's tree near 
Cape May light (house), which was still standing some twelve 
years ago, was a living reminder of the days when the "Jolly 
Rogers'' and her kindred roving corsairs were terrors to all 
that "went down into the sea in ships.'' They were Ishmaelites 
of the ocean blue, their crews res]:)ecting neither the laws of God 
nor man nor any flag save that of the skull and cross-bones. 
S])anish privateers cruised along the coast in 1740. and b'rench 
l)rivateers in 1747 and 1748. In 1759 the English i)rivateer brig 
Grau captured off iMve-mile Beach the I'rench vessel Rachel. 

What thiidv you of this: All the girls of I-'ive-mile Ueach, 
of Ca])e May and Rio (irande in 1757 knitted mittens to be sent 
to the Philadel])hia shops in barter for such finery as was then 
dear to the feminine heart, and everyl)ody — mind you, everybody 
• — made wampum out of the black i)arts of the nmssel shells, 
which was used as money in trading with the Indians.. T(^ sav 
41 



that in 1772 pewter dishes, flints, etc., were in use and that during 
the Revolutionary War salt-making and privateering were car- 
ried on on Five-mile Beach, will hardly astonish the reader, for 
enough has been written to show what a busy spot, what an 
interesting five miles of beach front, what now is Wildwood, 
Holly Beach and Anglesea were, in the time of the "merry Mon- 
arch" and the four Georges. 

The phenomenal storm which lasted nearly a month from 
December 12, 1826, to Sunday, January 7, 1827, and swept the 
coast from Labrador to Mexico and which made an island out 
of Cape May, wrecked over two hundred vessels, and from which 
two hundred and twelve bodies were recovered, and caused a 
money loss of over two million dollars, was of special interest to 
the denizens of Five-mile Beach. 

On Sunday, January 7, a fisherman named Hughes, collect- 
ing wreckage on the beach, saw some distance from the shore 
what seemed to be a box between two barrels. After much 
troul^le he secured the prize, a cradle covered with oil skin and 
lashed between two quarter casks. He removed the covering. 
There lay a child, apparently dead. Hastily cutting the lashing, 
he started for home with the cradle in his arms. His wife re- 
vived the hapless little derelict, and by night the baby showed 
no indications of its terrible struggle for life. 

In the cradle was a writing telling the story. Captain Fane 
and wife, on board a F>oston brig, having no expectations of 
escape, sought to save their only child, a girl, by giving her to 
Providence and the mercy of the sea. In the course of a few 
months the child w^as taken l)y relatives who lived in Boston. 

Emeline Fane, as the child was named, grew up to be a 
beautiful and accomplished woman, and went to England on a 
visit to relatives, and here she was wooed and won bv a nephew 
of Warren Hastings, the famous governor general of India. Her 
husl)and died three years after the marriage, and she married an 
Australian millionaire named Shellin. They embarked on the 
Wanderer, a liritish clipper ship, bound for Sydney, and no 
tidings were ever heard of the vessel thereafter. The deadly 
sea reclaimed the "child of the wreck." 

42 






y^ 




43 




" Give me thine angle, we'll to the river, there. 
My music plavins; far off, I will betray 
Tawny-finn'd fish ; my bending hook shall pierce 
Their slimy jaws." 

— Shakesfiearf — (Aiillioiiy and Clropahea). 



44 



THE 
JOYS 



HILARIOUS 
OF CRABBING 



MAW a time and oft" the writer lias asked the "wife of 
liis bosom" to go a-fishiiig with him — dilating- upon 
the deUghts of eatching l)hie fish, the httle fellows that 
frequent the inlet, flounders, bass and weak fish — but a "stony 
eye" was turned upon him invariably and a ready excuse was 
found for not going. lUit if crabbing was mentioned, then she 
was all animation and at once intensely interested — this thing 




CRABBING AT ANGLESEA 

and that thing could be easily put off until later, and she would 
indeed be delighted to go after the succulent fellows that can 
run backward, forward and sidestep with anything that skims. 

The season I write of was a peculiar one for crabbing, as the 
cold weather of the previous winter had frozen the nimble, crus- 
taceans in their beds of mud, and for months in the early summer 
there was none to be found, but, with the advent of September, 
the joyful news was spread ab-nU among the feminine contingent 
that hosts of crabs had arrived, evidently having come in from 
the south, and soon the sounds and inlets were swarming with 
them, and they were big, fine, fat fellows, with china-blue claws, 
as sprightly and as full of fight as a wild-cat 

45 



The dear ladies were soon in a flutter of excitement, and I 
was asked to make arrangements for a crabbing party of two — 
I was to get the bait, the Hnes and the boat, get the boat to the 
proper place and then leave them to do the rest. At the same 
time I was to be within hailing distance so that if anything imto- 
ward happened, almost immediate help might be extended to 
them. One of the pair was a rather ponderous woman, who 
had never seen a crab caught, had no idea how they would act 
when they were landed in the boat, nor any knowledge of how 
(juick they were to strike with their claws and how swiftly they 
could move about. The other one knew all their tricks and was 
boiling with suppressed excitement for the fun to l^egin. The 
large lady sat in the stern, the smaller one in the bow. And 
during the subsequent proceedings the stern of the boat at times 
was violently bol)l)ed up and down, making the one in the bow 
think it was an aquatic game of see-saw. The pieces of raw 
beef, which were used as bait, were quickly tied to the lines, 
dropped overboard, and with a landing net for each, the ladies 
were ready for business. The crabs promptly came to the 
attack*, whereupon No. i — the big woman — let out a scream that 
was easily heard across (irassy Sound. She had brought up a 
china-l)lue fellow and had gotten him into the boat, btit not into 
the basket. He made a feint for her ankles, side-stepped for 
her left hand, and she had swung around on the stern, l)ringing 
her feet up partly into the air, while the cral) was standing on 
his flippers and striking at her with his claws, but Xo. i was now 
safe, he couldn't reach her as her feet were first over one side 
and then the other of the boat and, acting upon the admonition 
of No. 2, she managed to get him into tlie net and then into the 
basket. Meanwhile No. 2 had been landing cralxs without nmch 
screaming and getting them securely housed, when another yell 
like the scream of the great Northern Loon split the air and 
stirred up once more the risibiliiies of the residents on the 
northern side of the sound, but this yell was continued in sec- 
tions, each one louder than its neighbor, so that one might think 

46 



that Xo. I was being "done to death." No. 2 in the meantime 
using her lungs in violent laughter, for if the truth must be 
told, a big, horrid monster, ugly as sin itself, with a hard, round 
body and a number of long, tapering legs and claws, had been 
hauled into the boat. It was a sea spider. "A what?" screamed 
No. I. ''A sea spider," said No. 2. "Take it away — take it awav. 
Ugh! The vile thing. Ugh! ugh! It's coming right for me," 
said No. r. "Crush it with your little tiny foot," savs No. 2, 

"crush it ; crush 
it." "Crush it!" 
So No. I dropped 
one of her feet 
upon it. and quiet 
for a few minutes 
was restored — 
but only for a 
little time. The 
crabs gathered 
around the boat 
so thick and were 
so hungry that 
on two or three 
occasions the bait 
woulcl be pulled 
up with three 
crabs and a sea 
spider firmly at- 
tached to it, and 
the crabs com- 
menced to get 
out of the l)asket 
— it was chocked 
full — and thev 
wandered here 
and there — and 
mostly there. No. i swung herself again on the stern of the 
47 




boat like as if she was on a pivot, first her feet would be on the 
starboard side and then in a jiffy they'd be to port, and screams 
and screams and screams tore through the atmosphere until the 
"rowboat autocrat" of Grassy Sound came running to the rescue, 
throwing them another basket to cage the nimble wanderers 
in. This, likewise, was soon filled and the lids tied down firmly 
so that not a claw could be pushed out in any direction, and in 
a couple of hours the crabbing party had done its work. The 
train thundered across the drawbridge, the precious catch was 
put into the baggage car. When the conductor came around 
for the tickets, No. i was sore and hoarse from screaming and 
No. 2 sore from laughing. Soon the home cottage was reached 
and it wasn't long until two big kettles full of boiling water were 
ready for the crabs. 

The writer was "permitted" to put the crabs into the kettles, 

and as the strug- 
gling, clawing crabs 
would "occasionally'' 
slip from his hands 
to the floor "in spite'' 
of his best efforts, 
then both Nos. i and 
2 would jump onto 
chairs, and the scenes 
and excitement at 
Grassy Sound were 
re-enacted o'er and 
o'er. 

Now to compare fishing with crabbing, as far as the fair sex 
is concerned, one of them says, "Fishing is a prosaic thing. 
You're waiting — always waiting — for a bite; the bites seldom 
come; but when they do, the fish are not always landed. More- 
over, you have to wait at times tmtil the tide comes in, again 
until it goes out, or wait until the wind changes or until some- 
thing else happens. Oh, pshaw! What's the use in going 
fishing, anyway, when we can go crabbing?" 

48 





49 




' We sat aroun' the leapin' blaze 
That setit its glitter different ways, 
An' struck the trees an" made 'em shine 
Like we was in a silver mine ; 
We laughed an' chatted matters o'er. 
As no one ever had before ; 
Until the woods, the first we knew 
Began to laugh an' holler too! " 

— Cai Icton. 



50 



OUR LAKE 

OUR LAKE" is somewhat peculiar in its contour. Its 
outline bears a slight resemblance to an acute triangle, 
the inlet being at the point and the outlet at one extreme 
of the base. Its length is about three antl a half miles, and the 
width at its widest about one mile. It is bordered by a forest 
of spruce, cedar and hackamack trees, and these have tinctured 
its waters and given them a rich brown tinge. A tiny rivulet 
tlows inward under a bower of alders, forming an aifluent whose 
channel is the favorite haunt of the mink, the otter and the 
weasel — an ideal spot, indeed, for the trapper. And not alone 
for the trapper. The hunter who seeks this region for his sport 
is apt to be rewarded with the sight of an amorous couple of 
moose threshing along the valley and making sad havoc with 
the thick growth of water plants, the overhanging foliage and 
the sloping banks of shale and clay. 

Several miles up, a dam once held l)ack the waters for the 
benefit of timber cutters. This was long ago, and the ghostly 
forms of drowned trees now strike the eye, spreading their 
spectral limbs over a thicket of alders, hazel and blueberry 
bushes interlaced with cranberry vines. Through these the 
water flows unhindered, its moving breast flecked with sun- 
light and leafy shadows. At the sides a wanton growth of 
deep, lank grass affords a hiding place for the timid deer as 
well as cosey beds for the moose, where he may take his naps 
wrapped in seclusion and seemingly safe from the prying eyes 
of the inquisitive hunter. But only seemingly safe. On one 
occasion I crept cautiously toward this favored spot and sur- 
prised not less than six deer, and many a moose have I seen 
resting here after his breakfast, imconscious of my near pres- 
ence and in blissful ignorance of impending danger. 

Just below the old dam there is a deep pool — a tempting 
resort for trout; and they are always there in abundance, and 
always hungry. Xor is their appetite at all capricious. No 
51 



artificial flies, nor dainty tackle will be needed for their capture. 
An alder pole, a bit of string- and, maybe, even a pin hook will 
answer the purpose. Then you may see the "speckled beauties" 
spring like flashes of light at the lure of your bait, though it be 
nothing more tempting than a homely grasshopper. 

Two miles further down the stream is the site of an aband- 
oned "driving camp," and here you will find both deer and part- 
ridge, and they are almost always "at home." Still further 
below, the stream gathers and forms a "dead water," whose 

bosom is covered with 
rich growth of aquatic 
plants. Mosses and lily 
pads flourish in profu- 
sion, the latter being" 
the daintiest dish on the 
varied bill of fare which 
the good Dame Nature 
has provided for Mr. and 
Mrs. Moose and their 
interesting offspring. 

Nor has Nature for- 
gotten another import- 
ant need of the moose 
family. They are ex- 
THE " ROCKY RIPS " travagautly fond of love- 

making, and she has so bordered the "dead water" with her 
verdure that it forms a perfect screen behind which the moose 
may court his inamorata, and even the tawny deer indulge in 
their gambols without the fear of mortal interruption. Silence 
reigns in this sylvan retreat. There is no rush of restless waters, 
no sighing of the breeze to break the stillness, and light indeed 
must be the tread of a huiUer who reaches its shadowy vicinity 
unheard. 

The "dead water" — which, with its dense growth of verdure, 
fills the upper point of Our Lake — gradually merges into a 
"thoroughfare." We follow this ior perhaps half a mile and then 

52 




we see the open lake spread out before us. its tranquil l)OSo:;i 
shining in the sun and now and then s\vei)t by a eatspaw breeze 
just strong enough to throw bright bands of silver across the 
mirrored shadows of the trees that fringe the shore. The trees 
are of cedar, spruce, pine and white birch — patrician trees, all 
old enough and venerable enough to w^ear the epithet and to 
warrant me in joining with the old English poet, Cowley, when 
he sings: 

"Hail, old patrician trees, so great and good! 
Hail, ye plebeian underwood! 

Where the poetic birds rejoice. 
And for their quiet nests and plenteous food 
Pay with their grateful voice." 

There can be little doubt that the trees which surround Our 
Lake are patrician, and that there is also plenty of "plebeian 
underwood" flourishing a1)out their giant trunks; but, as for 
the birds, I am sorry to say they are few. Neither do they have 
a "grateful voice." or. if possessed of one, they keep it to them- 
selves and refuse to let it out in song. There is one little fellow, 
however, that has a most plaintive note. He is known to the 
natives as "Old Sammy Peebles," but why or wherefore nobody 
knows. As Dundreary would say, ''That is one of the things 
that no fellow can find out." Sammy keeps very quiet during 
the day, but in the silence of nightfall we can hear his dirge-like 
note coming faintly through the shadows of the swamp. This 
funereal minstrel and the screeching bluejay comprise the entire 
concert talent that the feathered life of our vast woods can ofifer 
for our delectation. It is true that the kingfisher, the cross-bill, 
the peevvee, the robin and the red-headed woodpecker all have 
their home here, but they have sadly neglected the cultivation of 
their voices. They have a reason, however, for their neglect. 
They are too much wrapped up in their domestic affairs, and too 
busy over the serious problem of making a living to spend any 
time on a musical education. Of course we cannot blame them. 
Life is sweet to all of us, and probably much sweeter than music. 
53 



To return to Our Lake. When the deep shadows of autumn 
gather along its verge, what a marvelous richness of color glows 
out of them! Jack Frost is an accomplished artist, and where 
he has touched the seed and vine behold the varied yellows! 
They are all here, from the pale maples to the vivid orange, 
deepening into royal purple and madder-brown. Out from the 
midst of these the plumes of sumach rear themselves and flash 

like tongues of lire. 

Beneath these irrides- 
cent masses, the brown 
w'aters dance wdth the 
swirl of our canoe and 
catch and weave together 
the gorgeous splendor of 
the drooping branches 
and a still more gorge- 
ous sunset — a sunset 
such as none but he 
who loiters in these 
Xorthern wilds can ever 
hope to see and enjoy. 
To add to all this, no 
A COVE IN "OUR LAKE" phase of Nature is lack- 

ing in the environment to make the enchantment incomplete 
to man. 




"The meanest floweret of the vale, 
The simplest note that swells the gale. 
The coming sun, the air, the skies, 
To him are opening Paradise." 

Now let us drop poetry for the present and go over upon 
the other side of Our Lake. Here we wall find two coves formed 
by a bold ledge of rock, which projects into the waters. These 
recesses are the sanctuaries of the timid deer. Li the early 
morning and an hour or so before dark you will see them 
stealing softly down into the shallows where they nibble the 

54 



succulent grasses and disport and gossip in liappy deer fashion 
until it is time to hide away and rest. 

Many a tragedy in deer and moose life has been perpetrated 
in these twin coves. There was, for instance, the case of the 
giant bull ni()i)sc who ventured down in broad daylight roaring 
and splashing and grunting in the reckless abandon of his 
passion. A guide caught the sound of his challenge and, seizing 
an old rifle — which, by the way, was much the worse for wear — 
ran to the scene and met the bull face to face. The huge animal, 
with two bullets already in his body, ran up the road with the 
guide at his heels, firing as rapidly as he could load and reload. 
With three more shots he brought down the moose, a victim of 
his own reckless courage. Truly a lordly knight-errant was he, 
and not less brave than the hero of ancient chronicle who held 
his life at a pin's fee when "ladye fayre" called him froiu castle 
tower to deeds of valor and love. 

On one of our trips to these coves we had a little fire- 
fighting experience, the relation of which may not be uninter- 
esting. Xear the coves stood a big pine which had been riven 
by lightning, and was hollow from root to top. One bitterl}' 
cold day I imprudently started a roaring fire near the pine — so 
near that the flames reached the tree, ran up its chimney and 
out at the top, where the shifting wind caught the flames and 
threatened a forest conflagration of serious extent. It was 
only after hours of hard work, with cotmtless buckets of water 
and the lively use of axes that we won the battle against the 
fierce element. Then, w'eary and tired out by our labor, we 
paddled back to our cabin. 

A word or two in the description of this cal)in will not be 
out of place. It is hidden in a close growth of firs, poplars. 
birches, spruce and maples, and is built of fir logs. It has a 
porch in front, graced with rustic seats, and here, during the 
intervals of the chase, these pages were penned. Within its 
cheerful confines are shelves and cubby-holes, a table built of 
cedar and a wealth of lounging- conveniences. From the dining- 
rooms through a spacious window we look out U]ion ( Hu" Lake, 
55 



while fragrant logs blaze merrily in the big stove and fill the 
room's atmosphere with comfort and content. "Onr Dan" 
brings in the dinner, and our bill of fare runs after this fashion: 

Roast Venison. 

Brook Trout. 

Roast Grouse. Baked White Potatoes. 

And still Whiter Boiled Onions. 

Dessert, More of the Same. 

By the way, Our Dan is something of a philosopher in his 
religious ideas. Out of his small earnings he lays by a weekly 
sum which he devotes to the Church — no particular Church, for 
all creeds and denominations are alike to him, with the single 
exception of the Methodists. These he debars from his bounty. 
When he is asked why he discriminates against this sect, his curt 
reply is "because they handle the truth careless." As for Dan's 
creed, it begins and ends with the Golden Rule. To follow this, 




OUTLET OF "OUR LAKE" 



56 



he rightly believes is all that is required of him by his Maker 
and mankind. He also thinks that no doctrine is worthy of 
the name of Christian unless it has the "Rule" for its foundation. 

As Dan lives up to his creed and in his daily life tries to 
follow in the footsteps of the Master, there can be little doubt 
that at the final reckoning when he hands in the account of his 
earthly stewardship he will find "The Pearly Gates" wide open 
to let him freely through the portals of his home among the 
skies. 

And now to return to our dining tal)le, which we left so 
abruptly. It is here- that we tell and listen to tales of travel. 
It is here that we read and recite. And it is here that we encour- 
age a banter of wit between our head guide and our cook, whose 
sallies of humor are as original as his dishes. These wordv 
wars contain a mixture of the wisdom of the forest and down- 
East ciuaintness which never fails to fill our dining-room with 
hearty, wholesome laughter. 

To w'ash down our dinner we use neither wine nor cofYee. 
Xor do we need them. Clear, cold water dipped from a l)ubbling 
spring across the lake is our only nectar. 

Thus runs the current of our lives around the Paradise of 
Our Lake and — 

"Thus wDuld I double Life's fading space. 
For he that runs it well, twice runs his race; 

And in this true delight 
These unbought sports and happy state 
I would not fear, nor wish my fate! 
But boldly say each night 
To-morrow let my sun his beams display 
Or in clouds hide them, 1 have lived to-day!" 

In front of our porch we have a horizontal pole reaching 
between two trees ; from this pole is suspended a fat buck hang- 
ing by his feet. At the time of whiting, four or five moose l:)irds, 
sometimes called camp thieves — meat birds — are stealing the 
glistening rolls of white fat from the deer's sleek haunches. We 
reach for the little 22-rifle and, presto the feathered thieves are 
gone, laughing derisively at our slowness. 

57 



Down in one quiet corner of Our Lake a pair of exemplary 
loons have nested year after year and reared their broods, and 
whenever our canoes leave the outer world and enter the lake 
our coming is always welcomed and our ears greeted with the 
screeches of wild laughter peculiar to the loon. 

This season the family of the loon household was limited 
to four in number. It consisted of three adults, one of them 
being, probably, the nurse of a lone baby loon, a little fellow 
that looked very much like an animated ball of fur as he paddled 
along and dived into the recesses of the reeds to mock us from 
his hiding place with his impudent little note of laughter. 

A second dam lies upon the channel of Our Lake's outlet. 
This channel wanders for a few miles and then pours its waters 
into a big lake lying upon a lower level. On either side of the 
stream hard-wood ridges rise with slopes bedecked with all the 
brilliant tints of Autumn. 

When the beechnuts are plentiful, bruin, whose palate leans 
that way, is a frequent visitor to these parts. He grows fat 
and sleek on the rich feeding he finds on the ridges, but some- 
times pays rather dearly for it. Many a soft rug has he fur- 
nished the city fur dealer for the benefit of "my lady's tootsies." 

The bob-cat and black cat are also among our visitors, 
though they are not at all welcome ones. Often in the still 
hours of a frosty night while we were watching and patiently 
waiting for the expected grunt of the male moose, a screeching 
yell from one of the above-mentioned night-travelers would 
startle us and cause our heart to leap up into our throat. True, 
there might not be more than one yell, but one was quite 
enough. 

The muskrat is another denizen of this region. Where the 
big bowlders rise from out the depths of "the thoroughfare'' we 
may see a nniskrat army busily building their winter homes. 
We note each day the amount of work they have done the night 
before and can judge how well they have fed by the piles of 
nmssel shells — the empty dishes of their midnight supper. 

58 



Among' our wiklwood friends the most sociable and enter- 
taining' are the red scjuirrels or chicarees, as they are sometimes 
called. Like children, they are very lond of the game of "tag," 
and chase each otlier at breakneck speed first over our cabin 
roof, then up and down the trees, scampering atop the fallen 
logs that lie in their way, and scolding and cachiiuiating in such 
a vigorous manner that we often wonder their little throats don't 
burst. 

Now^ and then we catch a glimpse of those valuable little 
fur bearers, the martens. They have a special fondness for the 
squirrel, in fact they love him — as a dinner tidbit. In their 
season they are often trapped in this locality, their soft jackets 
finding their way to the city fur dealers. 

We have many strange animals hereabout, l)Ut the strangest 
of them all, with his wonderful eyes and massive horns, is the 
woodland caribou. In a former time, when the juniper or the 
hackamack trees flourished in rank profusion in the pine-tree 
State, the caribou revelled in its woods and bogs and grew fat 
upon the dainty black moss of the hackamacks. At times he 
would indulge his appetite on the gray moss of the spruce — but 
not as a matter of choice. Some years ago a predaceous worm 
destroyed the junipers and the caribou was compelled to leave 
his once favorite haunts in search of "fresh w^oods and ])astures 
new."' This season, as we are elad to note, the young junipers 
are springing up beside the ghosts of their ancestors, and in 
time they may 1)e attractive enough to woo the caribou back 
again to his former home. 

Thoreau, the naturalist, who passed within three miles of 
our lake in 1857, thus describes an evening spent in this vicinitv: 
"It was a splendid moonlight night, and T, getting sleepy as it 
grew late, for I had nothing to do, fomid it difificult to realize 
where I was. This stream was much luore unfrequented than 
the main one. It was only three or four rods wide, but the firs 
and spruce through which it trickled seemed yet taller by con- 
trast. Being in this dreamy state, which the moonlight enhanced, 
I did not clearlv discern the shore, but seeme*!, most of the time. 

59 




w 



60 



to be floatino- through onianicntcd grounds, for I associated the 
fir tops with such scenes — very high u]) some Broadway, and 
beneath c^r between their tops, 1 thought I saw an endless suc- 
cession of porticoes and columns, cornices and faqades, verandas 
and churches. I did iKjt merely fancy this, but in my drowsy 
state such was the illusion. I fairly lost myself in sleep several 
times, still dreaming of that architecture and the nol^ility that 
dwelt behind and might issue from it; but all at once I would be 
aroused and brought back to a sense of my actual position by the 
sound of Joe's birch-horn in the midst of all this silence 'calling 
moose,' tigh, ugh, oo — oo — oo — oo — oo — oo, and 1 prepared to 
hear a furious moose come rushing and crashing through the 
forest and burst out on to the little strip of meadow by our side." 
And so has it l)een with the writer, through many and man\' an 
enchanting moonlight night when the moose (//'(/ come and we 
heard the giant of the forest wading, splashing or feeding in the 
clear silvery lake, or with his passions aroused, crashing, roar- 
ing and tearing through the alders down by the water's edge, 
looking for his supposed mistress, in answer to our counterfeit 
call of the cow-moose. You, dear reader, caiuiot possibly im- 
agine the intense excitement of such a scene, nor can I even 
faintly picture it. 

Is it strange that I should have such a fancy for this halcyon 
spot? Is it strange that when amid the sunuuer dust and swelter 
of a city and weary in brain and body — T say is it strange that my 
fancy should then tear me from m\- tiresome desk and trans])ort 
me to the shores of ( )ur Lake? In the city there are a thousand 
discordant noises; here there is none. The city's atmosphere is 
filled with noxious fumes; liere the air is i)urit\- itself. In the 
city I am but one of a million; here, like Selkirk, "I am monarch 
of all I survey." In a word. Our Lake is a spot to approach 
with the keenest jo\- and to leave behind with as keen regret. 

At night, after the sun has set behind the cedars across the 
lake and we lie down upon our couch of fragrant boughs we lift 
our thought to the Great Ciiver of all good things and pra\- with 
"Tiny Tim," "(iod bless us, ever\' one!" 
6i 



In the morning the patter of the chickaree on the roof, the 
noisy hammering on the trees by the woodpecker, the chatter- 
ing and screeching of the bhiejays, and the loon with his early 
hymn to the sun — these are enough to awake and remind us 
that another happy day is born. A few steps bring us to the 
little wharf, where our pliant rod soon wins a breakfast from the 
lake's brown waters. While our catch is sizzling in the pan we 
take a delighted look at the radiance of old Katahdin whose 
sides are aglow with the light of the rising sun. Far away we 
see the outlines of other mountains mellowed by the distance 
and rising thousands of feet above the vast and forest-clad plain 
in which Our Lake is set, to sparkle there like a gem upon the 
emerald robe of Nature. 

Will Our Lake be forever what it is to-day? Alas, no! 
In time it will be changed. Very slowly, but not the less surely, 
all its beauty will be swept from the earth, and the wild creatures 
that now amuse and interest us will disappear to seek a liveli- 
hood in a more remote and primitive region. The sportive trout 
will no longer haunt the then diminished and stagnant waters. 
Our ridges will be converted into potato patches and our cedars 
into pails and tubs. No more will the cry of the loon or the 
honk of the wild goose give emphasis to the solitudes. Our 
Lake will slowly lose its waters and dwindle into a morass — a 
lone and uninviting spot, fit only for the breeding of fevers and 
the propagation of mosquitoes. But the time is not yet. So let 
us make the most of our forest gem. while we may, and beg 
Old heather Time to withhold his ruthless hand, and to be in no 
hurry to rob us of Our Lake and the enjoyment of its beauty. 



62 




63 




I^^^ i jj sg'.^y 



Heaps of sea-gear lie around ; a boat roofed shed, 
Quaint wicker-traps, and ropes sea-bleached, and floats' 

Bordering pitch-brown nets, clear sails outspread, 
And idle oars resting on idle boats." 

— 'J'ujii Ta\Ior. 



64 



OYSTERIN' AN' CLAMIN' 



ONE cold, raw day in the latter part of October, when the 
wind blew so fiercely that the fishing boats dared not 
venture outside of Hereford Inlet and the time hung 
heavy upon our hands, a trip up the sounds reaching far back 
to the mainland north of Grassy Sound was projected. Two as 
sturdy "sea salts" as ever sailed a boat, accustomed to all man- 
ner of bay shore work — "oysterin','' "clamin','' "fishin'," "cod- 
fishin','' "shootin'," "duckin'," and "pushin'," the latter accom- 
plishment being that of pushing or poling a boat for mud-hens 
while the gunner stands in the bow to do the shooting — were 
our guides. We were taken to a place where the tides met, 
causing a wide, circling eddy, and where the bottom was covered 
with oyster shells. Here our boat was anchored while Captains 
"George" and "Martin A." started for a walk on the adjoining 
marsh. We fished as best we knew how, using all manner of 
attractive bait, but without result. Either the fish were not 
there or else they were not hungry; at any rate we caught none. 
Occasionally we noted that our guides were afar ofif stooping 
down and picking up something, but of what it was we had no 
knowledge until they returned with two baskets heaped full with 
enormous sized oysters. Asked if we cared for any we said no; 
but, without deigning to notice the negative reply, one of the 
men opened a few of the shells, and to our amazement the oysters 
were a perfect picture, as fat as butter, or, as one of the men 
put it. "they looked like a piece of solid, fat pork." We tasted 
one of them and then we forgot all about the cold rain, the bad 
fishing, the piercing wind and other discomforts and literally 
gorged ourselves with these delicious fat and succulent bivalves. 
Upon inquiry we learned that they had been found in the fissures 
caused by the banks of the sound breaking away from the marsh- 
land; there they had grown from the tiny "spats" to the over- 
grown and gamy wild oyster which had so delighted us. We 
65 



were told by our companions that but a few years back the 
sounds and salt water ponds everywhere back of Five-mile 
Beach were enriched with great beds of just such oysters as we 
had eaten, but as there had been little or no transplanting done 
to replenish the beds they were legitimate prey for all comers, it 
being nobody's business to restock the beds. It is now an 
unprofitable business to search for them, but when a deposit 
of them is discovered their delicious and gamy flavor, their 
fatness, their monstrous size, will make such an impression upon 
the lucky man who feasts upon them as in after years to start 
his gastric juice to freely flow just to think of them. The oyster 

in its young days has many enemies, 
which make its growth to maturity 
problematical. The fierce sheepshead 
fish is a ruthless destroyer of the 
young "spats," crushing their shells 
with its strong teeth and sucking out 
their small bodies and the juice with 
the avidity of a man with a disordered 
stomach drinking a tumblerful of raw 
clam juice. The "spat" obtains the 
lime out of which to form its shell 
from the water, and the cjuicker its 
shell is formed the better is its chance 
of survival. The lime in the water 
-^-^ \ ":^=^ comes from springs in the interior 

- -_;— " which flow through a limestone for- 

mation — from deposits of limestone 
rocks in the ocean and from the decomposition of old oyster 
shells. On the oyster beds old shells are soon honeycombed by 
boring sponges and other marine animals, which enables the sea 
water to rapidlv dissolve and diffuse it. In a few years not a 
trace of it is left. It is like the almost mysterious disappearance 
of the great masses of bone which form the towering antlers 
of deer, caribou, moose and elk, and which are shedded annually 
bv these animals. In a few months they are gnawed out of 

66 




shape and consistence by the wood mice and field mice, who 
need the Hnie and phosphates which they contain, and their 
destruction is likewise helped along- by the elements, and thus 
soon all trace of them is gone. If all the oyster shells after 
being opened were returned to the l)eds they would aid the 
growth of the "spats" materially. The youngster nnist likewise 
have plenty of oyster mud to live upon— this is a light, black 
sediment, the washings of rich farm lands which finds its way 
by various little streams down to the sounds and is finally helped 
along by fierce storms, high tides and scouring ice, and in such 
manner it is carried out to the great ocean. 

I have for many years made periodical trips down to Broad- 
water Bay, \'a.. back of Hog Island. Here the oyster riotously 
thrives in a wild state, and the beds grow and grow until they 
form what are called oyster rocks, and at low tide these ovster 
rocks stand out in l)old relief and are generally covered with 
hosts of men who pick up the oysters that cluster around the 
opened and decomposing shells, carry them to a schooner which 
will be anchored close by, and for which they receive in return 
a fee of from lo cents to 15 cents per Ijushel. These oysters 
are taken to Chincoteague Bay, to Tuckerton, Al^secon P)ay, 
Alorris River and other points. They are there trans])lanted. 
where they thrive and grow fat in their changed surroundings. 
Thus the Morris Coves, Absecons and Cape May Salts are often- 
times really natives of \'irginia. 

The custom of transplanting oysters is as old as Christianity 
itself, as Pliny writes of the artificial breeding of ovsters in Lake 
Avernus, Italy. And the same methods in use then nearly two 
thousand years ago are still employed in small salt water lakes 
in the same district. "In 1853 ^1. De Bon, then Connnissioner of 
Marine of France, was directed by the ^Minister to restock certain 
exhausted beds by planting new oysters upon them, and during 
this work, which was perfectly successful, he discovered that, 
contrary to the general opinion, the oyster can reproduce itself 
after it has been transplanted to bottoms on which it never before 
existed. And he at once commenced a series of experiments to 
67 



discover some way to collect the 'spat' emitted by these oysters, 
and he soon devised a successful apparatus, which consisted of 
a rough board floor, raised about eight inches above the bottom 
of the water, near low tide mark, covered by loose bunches of 
twigs." 

In the aforementioned Broadwater Bay as I sat once in a 
boat concealed in a blind made of the branches of cedar trees 
stuck in the ground to make a screen to hide us from the wary 
red-head duck, the brant and the artful wild goose, I noticed 
a great number of young oysters clinging to the cedar boughs 
Hke barnacles upon a ship. The guide commenced to open 
some of the largest ones, and as they were very sweet, and were 
delicious almost to the melting point, I ate a goodly number 
— too many by far, as before many hours I suffered from an 
acute attack of ptomaine poisoning, which speedily drove me 
North to home and to a doctor. So, while they are at times small 
and innocent looking and exceedingly tempting to the palate, 
they are not to be trifled with, as in my case at least they came 
very near "putting me out of the running." 

A writer who takes a supreme delight in incredible statistics 
says that a good-sized oyster will lay about sixteen million eggs, 
and if half of these were to develop into female oysters we 
should have from a single female eight million descendants in 
the first generation, and in the second eight million times eight 
millions, or 64,000,000,000,000,000. As there is no way of prov- 
ing or disproving this man's statement, we must let it stand as 
it is, as life is too short to quarrel about it. 

Now as to "clamin' " — as fine clams as ever enriched a clam 
chowder or made a clam bouillon are to be found in the sounds 
back of Five-mile Beach. Not, however, in such profusion as 
in times of yore when they were shipped away in car loads, but 
in such quantities that the patient "clam-er" can earn a very 
good living and a quick sale for all the clams which he can 
"catch." It is not many years since that the present Mayor of 
Anglesea made a shipment of four carloads of clams at one time 
to a consignee in New York, which were to be crushed and 

68 



squeezed, strained and prepared for l)Ottled clam bouillon. Four 
carloads of clams — just think of it! their number, their weight 
and the amount of bouillon which they would make to nourish 
the sick and to brace up the men who had "been making" a night 
o'nt." They would help to furnish the residents of our great 
country who live thousands of miles away from the sea with one 
of the most nutritious and palatable decoctions of sea food that 
ever pleased the palate of the modern epicure or enriched the 
dietary of the sick room. 

The work of digg"ing- for clams — of watching for their 
"signinV' as the bayside Virginians put it — is to some men a 
most fascinating employment. It surely is healthy, and it is 
undoubtedly profitable if the "clamer" is at all industrious and 
persistent in his work. Not long ago a clerical friend of mine took 

his family down 
to Holly Beach to 
spend the summer 
there. He had a 
young son, a lad 
of fifteen, who be- 
came enamored of 
"clamin'," and soon 
he made enough 
c^"'' — " "'' "^ out of it to buy 

himself a boat, and 
also laid by a goodly sum of money in the bank, which was a 
great deal more commendable than the custom of most youths 
in spending all the money coming to them during the summer 
season in seaside dissipation, and who oftentimes return to 
their homes utterly used up in health and pocket as well. 

It is said that when bears were plentiful in South Jersey 
that they were often seen breaknig clam shells by hammering 
them with a rock and then tearing out and eating the rich-juicy 
meat. I once saw a gull fiying straight up in the air and drop- 
ping something that looked like a stone into shallow water. 
This it did repeatedly, rising higher and higher each time. We 
69 




sailed over close enough to note that the mystery was one that 
was easily solved. The gull had a big clam which it was thus 
trying to break and which it at last succeeded in doing, for before 
we sailed away we saw it pick out the meat from the broken 
shell. 

That fish are ravenously fond of clams we all know, but 
many will be surprised to learn that w'ild ducks often meet a 
death from drowning because in sticking their bills into the 
open mouths of clams the clams promptly shut their vise-like 
jaws, which hold the ducks down as if in a steel trap until they 
are drowned. In a town in the interior of the state a rat found 
a clam shell partly open and thrust his paw in to scoop out the 
meat. The clam promptly closed his shell and the rat in spite 
of all his struggles, was held a prisoner until he was discovered 
and dispatched. So we can all see that the clam knows a trick 
or two that shows him to be an up-to-date creation, and not a 
being that acts "like dumb-driven cattle.". 

The story of the recluse who fed a pet clam, talked to it 
until it knew his voice, and which became so attached to him 
that it followed him around wherever he went. Intt in climbing 
up a pair of stairs following after its master it unfortunately 
slipped and fell from the top landing and broke its shell and thus 
died — to his master's intense grief — only shows that the clam is 
not so dumb as he looks. 

Down below Wildwood at the "new Cape May" operation 
there is a big and powerful dredge at work, and among the many 
submerged things it has cast up on the surface are a number of 
ancient clam shells, about the size of an ordinary dinner plate. 
They were exhumed from the blue nuid, and when sent to the 
scientists in Philadelphia whose business it is to be posted upon 
clam genealogy they were pronounced to be at least 10,000 years 
old. In fact it is plain that the clam family is the oldest upon 
the coast. 



70 




71 



mwiPPMii^' 



i m i j i m m e ,:^i^ _^tt:^_ »c-tHL-. 




-,-!**r-*;«- - 



' Oh weel I mind, oh weel I mind, 

Tho' now my locks are snow, 
How oft langsyne I sought to find 

What made the bellows blow ! 
How, cuddling on my grannie's knee, 

I questioned night and day. 
And still the thing that puzzled me 

Was, where the wind came frae." — Burns. 



72 



WILDWOOD BY THE SEA 
AS A HEALTH RESORT 



THE strenuous life that the average business man, if he 
be anywhere near to the front with his competitors, is 
now leading, is rapidly filling the seaside and mountain 
resorts of the Atlantic and Pacific coasts with worked-out, 
worn-out men — men with brainfag, men with various forms of 
uric-acid poisoning, rheumatism, lumbago; men with nervous 



ii ri i j iiii<y '8! ii i ii ' imn I' ll 





1 




THE SPLENDID WILDWOOD BEACH 

prostration, who jump at the slamming of a door; men with 
paralyzed limbs, who are wheeled about in rolling chairs; men 
who are sent far away from home to be free of the telephone, 
free from letters, free from interviews for news, free from the 
perplexities, the importunities of friends and of applicants for 
positions, of people with merchandise to sell, of law-suits and 
of the thousand other nerve-racking, strength-sapping things 
that are the necessary and unavoidable conditions that a business 
man is compelled to endure in order to be in the "front of the 
procession" among his fellows. As a forcible index of the stern 
reality of the above statement and of the price men have to pay 
73 



in health and strength for their business success, it may be 
stated that at one time, at one hotel, in Southern California, 
during the winter of 1902, there were housed therein no less 
than thirty-nine millionaires, among whom were thirteen multi- 
millionaires, and the majority of them w-ere sufferers from excess 
of uric acid, caused perhaps by sumptuous living and want of 
exercise. 

For a year or more I had been afflicted with an occasional 
back-breaking attack of lumbago, with an impaired digestion, 
and a brain wearied, beyond expression, from the multiplicity 
of things it had to grapple with. In the latter part of December, 
after consultation with some leading physicians, I was advised, 
on account of the condition of my health, to immediately journey 
to the southern part of the "Golden State," and so it fortuned 
that on the last day of the year icj02 I found myself seated in a 
parlor car, the proud possessor of a long strip of paper, which 
entitled me to a passage by rail to Coronado beach, at the most 
southern part of Southern California. There I spent the winter, 
living in the sunshine and breathing the highly electrified air 
which came at times over the great American desert, which is 
but a few miles distant from that resort. 

For nearly three months I lived upon a careful diet, was out 
every minute of daylight, and likewise paid close attention to 
the advice of my physicians as to exercise, walking, bathing, etc. 
When the time came to turn homeward, I felt as if my trip had 
been a failure. In my journey to the eastern seaboard, while 
passing through the desert region, with its hot sands, and hotter 
winds, for two days we experienced a temperature of ninety- 
three degrees and over, and upon reaching the Middle West we 
ran into a temperature which chilled us to the bone, although 
it was only in the sixties. When the shelter of friends and 
home were reached, my condition was even more reduced as 
to strength than when I left. The doctors told me that I had 
made a distinct gain, inasmuch that I had taken on new and 
better flesh in lieu of that which had been lost, and to that extent 
I was better. But as to the strength with which to meet the 

74 



requirements of a strenuous l)usiness life, it was sadly wanting'. 
In consultation with the same kin<lly and skilled physicians 
who were my advisers in the December previous, the decision 
was reached that the expected benefits from the Calif(M-nia trij) 
had not been realized and that I should start as soon as possible 
for the Austrian Tyrol, and there partake of the celebrated and 
beneficial Ijaths that were believed to be a certain cure for cases 
like mine. It may well be imagined that after spending nearly 
five months away from home, we did not relish the idea of at 
once starting" awav upon a long trip to a foreign land, and 




WILDWOOD BEACH, LOOKING NORTH 

spending a number of months among strange people, with 
nothing to assure me that at the end of my sojourn I would 
be able to rejoice in a renewal of mv accustomed health and 
strength. 

While this ])erplexing (piestion was thus revolving in my 
mind a friend advised that the air and surroundings at W'ildwood 
would give mc all the benefit that I couUl ever hope to obtain 
by making a journe\- to (iastein in the Austrian Tyrol. It was 
hard to believe the statement, which he stoutl\- maintained as 
being true, that the air at W'ildwoi^d ditTered so greatly from 
the atmospheric conditions either at Cape .Ma\, .\tlanlic City 
75 



or other places on our eastern seaboard, but his earnestness 
finally so impressed me that I made a visit one day in the latter 
part of May to Wildwood. 

I was there not an hour — just had time enougii to walk 
around and see the place — when I said to my wife that Wildwood 
suited me better than any place I had yet seen, and there and 
then decided upon securing a home for the summer. And so 
we moved down, and were established in a comfortable, cozy 
cottage, near to Old Father Ocean, where we could breathe the 
ozone from the salty expanse of water, and where, during the 
day, the time could be pleasantly spent in fishing, vvalking, 
bathing, reading and taking an occasional trolley ride to enliven 
things the summer could be passed. Only once during the 
sunnner did I venture away from the beautiful home and the 
beautiful surroundings which I enjoyed to the full. 

Here I found a resort whose sidewalks were paved with 
modern pavements, the residents furnished with pure water from 
deep artesian wells, with streets one hundred and eighty feet 
apart, leading at right angles from the sea to the sounds. With 
a fine system of drainage, a careful daily gathering of waste 
paper and other rubbish, likewise a daily collection of garbage, 
and a bi-weekly carting away of ashes. The streets so wide and 
so close together that a free circulation of air was always pos- 
sible in the hottest of days. A resort with an almost paternal 
civic government — where no questionable amusements are per- 
mitted, a beach as fine as any the Avorld ever helped to make, 
and a resident population always zealous in protecting the good 
name of the communitv, and in extending a uniform courtesy 
and a hearty welcome to strangers. 

Anc^her feature of Wildwood, which is a source of almost 
daily pleasure and wonder, is the remarkable growth of wild- 
wood trees, twisted and intertwined into all sorts and conditions 
of tangles, holly trees growing into and out of cedar trees. 
Siamese twin trees, bound as firmly with an indissoluble band 
as ever the Siamese twins were. Tt is said that that grand "old 
man," so long the editor of the Public Lc(li:;cr — Wm. A". AIcKean 



— who has now gone to his rest — used to visit Wildvvood fre- 
quently, spending the most oi his time, not on the beach with 
the fleeting crowds, l)ut in the silent and profound contempla- 
tion of the wonderful vagaries that nature in one of her most 
capricious moods exhibits in the startling growths of Wildwood 
■ — at Wildwood the resort so fittingly and happily named. Here 

are the wild holly, 
the marsh mallow or 
wild hollyhock, the 
field daisy, the cardi- 
nal flower, the blue- 
Ijell, the snowdrop 
and also the poison 
ivy. The wild flowers 
seem to come and 
go in a stately pro- 
cession, showing- a 
veritable keleido- 
scopc panorama of 
wild flower loveli- 
ness, every week 
during the summer 
bringing a lusty, 
vigorous growth of 
some new form of 
floral life unrivaled 
anywhere along the 
eastern seaboard. 

The c 1 i n g i n g 
vines, the tangled 
jungles, the stately trees, the secluded sylvan paths, within a 
few minutes walk from the beach, captivate the senses by their 
almost tropical luxuriance. No wonder that before the advent 
of steel rails into this halcyon wilderness, the pretty water ponds 
embowered in it were the fitting sanctuary of the wild duck, the 
resting place upon its migratory flight of the Canada goose, the 

^' LofC. 




METHUSIILAH 




78 



happy feeding" ground of the stately bhie heron and the ahnost 
sacred spot where the eager sportsman nianv a time and oft 
flushed and kihed the phunp and sohtary woodcock, the wary 
U'ilson snipe, and the many colored (hick, witli an occasional 
red fox or cotton-tailed rabbit, to complete the filling of his game 
bag. The game laws and lack of strength prohibiting the use 
of the gun during my stay, fishing per force became my summer's 
vocation, and I soon learned that the fish, like the flowers, come 
and go in procession, each species needing some different 
method, some different bait perhaps from the others, and so it 
came to pass that with rod and reel I brought to land, sea bass, 
blue fish, flounders, snapping mackerel, weak fish, king fish, eels, 
sea robins, skates. Cape May goodies, perch, porgies and a 
motley assortment of sharks. Where, on all the coast, could 
vou find greater variety of fish or in greater abundance? 




FISHING AT ANGLESEA 



79 



JUL 21 IS05. 




OCEAN BOUND, FLOWER GOWNED 

FOREST CROWNED 

WILDWOOD." 



80 



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LIBRARY OF CONGRESS 




014 207 900 8 



